The Dreaming
by Lynn Luther
Summary: Since everybody else is inserting themselves into stories, I thought I'd join the fray.
1. Arrival

_**Author's note:** This is sort of a dream that I had and sort of a thing where I put myself into an episode. Sorry, I was bored. Names and sleeping habits have been changed to protect the guilty. Enjoy..._   


********************************************************* 

"Good night, dearling. Sweet dreams." 

"I love you, my sweet sexy husband." 

"Love you, angel." 

My husband snuggled up to me, and I remember sighing... 

*************** 

"Lights!" 

I swam in the sheets. I struggled to attach my memory of my husband sleeping next to me to what was obviously NOT my huband's voice snapping a strange command. 

Lights blared against my closed eyelids. I saw entire sunbursts come to life against my retinas. Reds and yellows, finally subsiding into a mellow glow. Knowing I was in for a painful surprise, I popped my eyes open anyway. 

For a moment, I was blinded by sleep in my eyes and flourescent lights blaring, not to mention my splitting headache. It was like a marching band took up temporary residence in my frontal lobes. It was like an elephant was tap dancing to "Livin' La Vida Loca" up there. It was like a police spotlight sent through a million prisms and then beamed directly into my brain, foregoing the usual route of my eyes first. It was no fun, really. 

I finally managed to get my wayward eyes to focus on the brownish blur that had imposed itself between myself and the source of the light. It was a face. A male face. A baby face, with large brown eyes and a cheeky grin. A dreadlock hung between his eyebrows. 

"'Ello. Um, not to be forward, but you are in my bunk and totally naked, lady. Is this an invitation? Or shall I simply take a few piccies to make this a Kodak moment?" 

I goggled at the face for a moment. Then, I realized that he, whoever he was, was right. I _was_ naked. Fortunately for me, the sheets covered the most incriminating bits. Unfortunately for my new friend, the sheets covered the most incriminating bits. I took in the body that was attached to the face. He, whoever he was, was naked from the waist up. He wore a pair of boxer shorts that had definately seen better days. His body was soft and round, like a giant teddy bear. I had to admit, he was awfully attractive... Suddenly, the voice and face clicked in my sleep addled brain and I felt my eyes open wider, my mouth gape open and a wheezy breath come out. 

"Lister? Dave Lister?" 

Now his eyes widened a bit. 

"I'm afraid you have me at a disadvantage, lady... well, I guess not, really. You're the nekkid one, after all." _Only just,_ I thought. His grin, which was already wide, threatened to take his head off, like a door on hinges. 

Unconsciously, I grabbed at the sheets which were all that stood between myself and a grin that could melt butter at fifty paces. 

Lister grinned at me again. Across the ship, butter melted. 

"My name is Cee Dee." For some reason, I was loathe to give Lister my real name. And Cheezdanish would lead to all sorts of awkward questions, so the shortened version would have to do. 

"Well then, Cee Dee, nice to meetcha. I suppose you wouldn't want to tell me how you ended up in me bunk with no pajamas on, do you?" 

Gingerly, I shifted into a sitting position, making sure to take the sheets with me. Lister looked gravely dissapointed. I felt mollified. 

I know I'm not much to look at. Ok, I'm blonde. Ok, I've got a womanly type body. When it comes to the face, however... well, I've got a face-shaped face. I've got eyes that look like eyes and they aren't in odd places. I've got a nose. It's nose-y and vaguely smallish. My mouth is there, too. My chin doesn't exactly jutt, but is sure as hell isn't a shrinking violet, either. Forget peaches-and-cream complexion. Mine's more like pepperoni and extra mozzerella. And my ears kinda hang there, which is good really, otherwise I'd have no place to hang my glasses. 

Glasses? My hand flew to my face. No glasses. No wonder Lister looked so damn blurry. Ya see, along with my face and body, my eyesight ain't so hot either. If you're two feet away and I don't have my glasses on? Forget it. You're officially blurry. 

Lister cocked his head inquringly at me. He'd noticed my strange hand gesture, obviously. I shrugged at him, in answer to both questions. 

"I really have no idea how I got here. One moment I was asleep in bed, at home, and the next... you were snapping 'Lights' and here I was." 

"And the hand to the face?" 

"My glasses are gone." 

"Do you normally sleep with your glasses on?" He crossed his eyes at me. 

"No, of course not!" I laughed, making my own silly face. 

"Well, that explains it. You were obviously transported here by some thing or other, just as you were. So, no clothes. No glasses. Et cetera." 

I knew that there was one test of this theory. I glanced down at my left hand, the only place on my body that never changed, for of one simple reason. 

My wedding band. The symbol of the ever-lasting love that I share with the man who is the most in the world to me. 

I never take it off. Not even to shower or do the dishes. 

It wasn't there. 

Gone. Not even a dent in my finger where the ring should be. 

"What is it?" asked Lister 

"My ring... My wedding ring..." 

Before I could stop them, hot tears were in my eyes. This always happened when I was frustrated or scared. Call it a character flaw. Call it an annoying habit. Call it Ethel, but whenever things don't go my way, I cry. 

And now I cried like a child who had lost her favorite dolly. 

Before I knew what was going on, Lister's arms were around me and he held me against his shoulders, letting the cry work it's way out of my system. I sobbed against him for a long while, like I could never cry again in my life. Finally, the sobs subsided to sniffles, and the sniffles gave way to gulps. I looked up at Lister and asked, in a very shakey voice, "Do you have a cigarette, Dave?" 

"Of course." He was up and across the room to his locker. He pulled out a pack of crumpled cigarettes, came back to the bunk and shook one out to me. Then, to continue the strange, gentleman like behavior, he flicked a lighter in my general direction and lit my cigarette. Then, he lit one for himself. 

After a few nervous pulls, I calmed down a bit to say, "Thank you. Ashtray?" 

"Nope." 

"Oh." I shoulda guessed. A slob like Lister probably _would_ shake his ash all over the floor. Well, when in Rome... 

We smoked together in silence for a few minutes. I finished the smoke, and looked to Lister for direction. He handed me a lager can. I dropped the butt into the proffered can, hearing a satisfying hiss. Lister dropped his own in there, stood up, crossed over to the locker again and pulled out a stained tee-shirt. He tossed it at me, grinning. 

"For you, fair Cee Dee. Unless you want to wear the sheets like a toga?" 

I demurred, while inspecting the shirt. It didn't smell too badly, and for that I was grateful. "I don't suppose that you would have a bra laying around somewhere, would you?" 

"What size?" he asked with a mischivious twinkle. 

"36 C." I said automatically, before I could censor myself. I realized I'd been had just as Lister burst out laughing and hooting. I could only blush. I hadn't blushed like that since I was in high school. 

"How about pants?" I asked with an eyebrow raised. 

"First you think I have bras, then you want women's pants? What do yer think I am?" He sounded mock offended, but he was grinning. 

My brain made a quick trans-Atlantic jump. Pants were underpants. Trousers were leg coverings. 

"Trousers, then? Shorts? Coulottes? Anything?" 

He giggled at me again, and crossed back over to the locker. After a moment of searching, he came up with a pair of khaki trousers with big pockets on the legs. And only one curry stain. 

A man after my own heart. 

"They may be a bit big, but they don't fit me anymore, for some odd reason." He patted his stomache. I giggled in turn. "I'll be just outside the door, ok? Holler if you need anything." 

"Ok. Thanks, Dave." 

He must have heard the genuine thanks in my voice, because instead of grinning at me again, he just smiled gently and was out the door. 

I untangled myself from the sheets and hopped off the top bunk, shivering at the sudden coldness of the floor on my bare feet. I wondered briefly why Lister always complained about having the top bunk, and realized that he complained because of Rimmer. It had nothing to do with actual stuff. Frankly, I've always loved the top bunk. I had a feeling that Lister was the same way. But, of course, he had to bitch at Rimmer for some reason. Shrugging, I slipped on the tee-shirt, feeling awkward due to the lack of over-the-shoulder-boulder-holder support. Just as I was zipping up the trousers (which, I might add, were WAY too large in the waist area, but it was ok, as my ample hips held them up...) I heard the door open with a woosh. 

I spun towards the sound, figuring that it was Lister popping in to try to catch me au natural. "Dammit, Lister, this isn't funny! I'm a married wo... man..." 

It wasn't Lister. It was Rimmer. 

Rimmer, "H" emblazoned across his forehead, wearing his red Space Corp uniform from series 5. The really, really, _really_ sexy one. 

Ok, I'm married. I love my husband very much. But this was Rimmer standing across from me. He of the tall, brown haired, hazel eyed splendor. 

Did I mention that I love my husband? Did I mention that my husband has all the previously mentioned sexy features? Did I mention that tall, brown haired, light eyed guys are and always have been my type? Did I mention that I have a crush on Rimmer because he kinda looks like my husband? 

I was in trouble. 

Rimmer and I stared at each other for a long moment, both of us totally lost for words. He recovered first. 

"Who are you?" 

Oh, that accent... 

"I'm Cee Dee. I'm, uh, kinda lost." 

"I'm Arnold J. Rimmer, Second Technician, SSC, BSC." I wondered why he didn't offer his hand. Oh, yeah. Hologram Rimmer. Series 5 or maybe the first episode of 6. So no handshaking here. But he was looking at me like I was the last thin mint in the bottom of the cookie box. He had his hands behind his back and his smirk nearly reached his ears. And his eyes... 

Oh, those eyes. They were looking directly into mine. Oh, smeg... 

"I know. Silver Swimming Certificate, Bronze Swimming Certificate. J for Judas. You want everybody to call you Ace." 

His eyes narrowed for a moment. "Ok, what did that gimboid tell you about me?" 

"Huh?" Oh. Of course. He thought Lister had been knocking him in front of me. "Nothing. I just..." Oh boy. How to explain this? "I know who you are." 

He blinked at me. "How?" 

"That's a damn good question. Um..." 

Fortunately, I was saved by the bell. Rather, I was saved by a timely entrance by Lister, who came rushing in, out of breath. "Rimmer! Don't... Oh." He stopped when he saw that I was fully dressed and that Rimmer and I had already met. 

"Waiting right outside the door, huh?" I asked, grinning. 

"I had to go to the loo," he said with an embarrassed smirk. I could only laugh. 

Rimmer, meanwhile, was looking at me. Studying me. Like I was an astro-engineer's text book. But far more interesting. I gulped, and then I did something outrageously stupid. 

I turned on my "movie star" smile and I winked at him. 

I flirted with him! Gah! I should have known better. I knew that this man, when given an inch by the opposite sex, would take the whole smegging mile and run with it! 

A word of advice, ladies. Never, never, NEVER flirt with a man who is desperate. Especially if you like him. You will never hear the end of it. 

Yep, there were the fingers through the hair and the nostrils dilating and the eyes widening. He was preening for me. Lister saw this. He glanced at me, eyes wide with horror and shock. And a silent question. Did I want him to save me? 

Good question, Dave. Lemme get back to you on that one. 

Rimmer was suddenly all smiles and eyebrows and courteous guestures. I wondered briefly why he didn't just try to grab me and haul me into his bunk for a quick snog. Then I remembered. He was a hologram. Since he was in his red uniform, I assumed that I had dropped in pre-Legion. No solid hologram light bee yet. So I was saved from my folly. 

Or so I thought. 

"Lister, pull a chair up for our esteemed guest. Have you no manners at all?" He watched as Lister pulled up a chair for me. Lister glanced at me again, all but barfing in his unspoken desire to save me from Rimmer. I very subtly shook my head "no" at Lister, who, for his part, simply shrugged at me. 

"On yer own fool head be it..." said Lister aloud. 

"What?" asked Rimmer. 

"Oh, nothing," sniggered Lister, and swung his body up onto his bunk. 

I just stuck my tongue out at him. For some odd reason, Lister and I had a strange bond growing between us. Maybe he recognized a kindred spirit in slobbyness. Maybe the crying jag had made us instant friends, even though we had barely spoken a hundred words. Maybe he was like this with everybody. (Except Rimmer...) But I knew that he cared about me and my well being. 

Maybe it was because I was the first woman he'd seen in almost 5 years... 

For whatever reason, I couldn't help but feel Lister's eyes upon me as Rimmer tried to flirt with me, but clumsily. 

"You're quite young, then?" were the first words out of Rimmer's mouth when we both settled down. 

"Not quite as young as I look. I'm 25." I said with a chuckle. 

"And you're American?" 

"Yeah. California girl by birth and nature." 

"And you're a woman?" 

"Last I checked..." 

Silence. Well, near silence. Lister was making gagging sounds from up on his bunk. 

"Do you like to play Risk?" This came out in a rush. As if he were afraid of what my response would be. 

"As a matter of fact, yes I do." 

Rimmer stared at me for a moment. "You're joking?" he whispered. 

I couldn't help myself. I laughed as I said, "Yes, Rimmer, I do like to play Risk, but I don't memorize every throw of the dice and write it down in my Risk journal, if that's what you want to know." 

Oh, way to go, smartass. Knowing what I know of Rimmer, that was exactly the wrong thing to say. I couldn't help myself. As sympathetic as I am to Rimmer when I watch his adventures, the television doesn't do justice to what a smeghead he actually is. I could see why Lister goads Rimmer as he does. He's an easy target. 

Just as I used to be. Until I got a few books under my belt and a couple of nasty shocks that NO young woman should have to endure... 

I suppose that's why I've got a thing for Rimmer. He's like myself in many respects. No, I'm not carreer obsessed, or cowardly, or snide. But I'm an easy target, easily frustrated. Bullies sense this. 

I remember one time in the seventh grade. I was just beginning to hit puberty. Boys facinated me, and at the same time repulsed me to no end. I was still a child, though. Many childish habits stuck to me like taffy sticks to your fingers. For example, I hadn't learned yet, that, when a young lady goes to retrieve an object from the floor, you shouldn't bend over at the waist to fetch it. Rather, you bend your knees, get into a crouching position and then get the item. 

What you don't know can't hurt you, right? 

Riiiiiight. 

I bent over at the waist to pick up my pencil that had rolled onto the floor. Leaving my rear end sticking up towards the ceiling. The young man (for lack of a better description...) who sat behind me in class took that as an invitation. He walked up behind me and, with his whole hand, fondled me in a way that no 12 year old should know how to do. 

I didn't know what was going on at first. I startled into a standing position, pencil forgotton. Then, this little man decided that he liked it better when I was bent over, and gave me a shove to indicate that that's what I had to do again. 

Well, never let it be said that, once a bully gets onto my scent, I don't try to outmaneuver him. 

I took a step forwards, away from the prying hands. Thinking that this would be enough to give this guy the hint. 

Wrong again. 

He grabbed my shoulder. So, I did what my dad taught me to do in this situation. 

I punched the creep right in the kisser. 

Keep in mind that I was approximately 4'10" at the time, weighing in at just barely 100 pounds. This boy was a half foot taller than me and must've outweighed me by a good 35 pounds. My fist slammed into his nose at slightly below the speed of sound. He went down like a sack of potatoes. 

WHAM! 

Of course, later in the principal's office, there was all sorts of trouble. Until my side of the story came out. 

I was sent home early, due to my excitment and shakes. He was suspended for 3 weeks. 

But I digress. Remembering sexual harassment from 13 years ago doesn't help with the here and now. Right now, I had to deal with a crestfallen Rimmer, whom I had just been very, very mean to. 

"I'm sorry, Rimmer. I didn't mean it." 

"It's all right." But I could tell that it wasn't. Time for a subject change. 

"So, where's the Cat and Kryten? I haven't seen either of them yet." Hint, hint... 

I got the subject change, but not exactly as I wanted... 

"How do you know so much about us?" came from Lister as he swung himself back off the bunk. 

Good question, Dave. Lemme get back to you on that one. 

Dammit, this wasn't going according to plan. I had already screwed up by admitting that I knew their names. And here I was, some anomolous girl stuck on a mining ship three million years from Earth, and I had _no smegging way to explain anything!_ If I did tell the truth, they'd think I was crazy. I'd be put into the deep freeze unit until they could figure out what to do with me. Or worse, put on Floor 13. (Wait, no, that's Series 8. This has to be Series 5. So they don't know about Floor 13 yet. So that's good, I guess... And I can't mention it. It'd totally fuck with causality. So watch your smegging mouth, Cheezdanish.) (I'm in a lot of trouble. You know that list of character and feature flaws I listed earlier? Well, add to them a big fat mouth.) 

Once again, Fate smiled upon me, and I was saved from answering incriminating questions by the arrival of Kryten and the Cat. 

Now, Kryten smells funny. Like a bad batch of WD40. Have you ever been in an airport, and when the planes take off, you sniff the air? And you get a whiff of that kinda gassy, ozone-y smell? Just like that. Until they invent Smell-o-Vision, you'll never know the wonder that is Kryten's stench. Lister and Rimmer ignored it, so I did my best to ignore it as well. It was tough, though, lemme tell you. 

I couldn't tell you what the Cat smelled like, because Kryten's smell totally overpowered my olfactory glands. The Cat took one look at me, and his eyes popped out of his head. He looked quite happy to see me. 

Kryten took one look at me and his eyes popped out of his head. Literally. He had to chase them across the floor. 

I began to wonder absently whether or not these guys were insane. I mean, yeah, I was the first woman they'd seen in a while, but I'm really not all that and a big bag of chips. Maybe they were staring at my tits... 

Naaaaah... 

The Cat made a swift transition. One moment, he was at the door, the next he had his hand in mine and was waggling his eyebrows at me. 

"Well, helloooo, there. I'm the Cat. And you are sexy with a capital SEX," he purred. "You wanna go have sex now, or shall we have dinner first?" 

I tried to supress a smirk and said, "You don't even know my name." 

"Oh, so you want a committment, is that it? Well, forget it, babe. You're too fast for this cat!" He dropped my hand, crossed to the mirror, and began to sing quietly to himself. I glanced at Lister, who grinned at me. I gave him the thumbs up sign. One hurdle down... 

Kryten, meanwhile, had gotten hold of his eyes and had replaced them in his sockets. He blinked at me a few times. I watched him cautiously. 

I knew that Kryten was the one that I had to really watch. He was the most logical one. He was the one who could consider me a threat to the crew. If there was ever a mention of putting me in deep freeze, it would most likely come from him. He had no gonads with which to think. I couldn't use my dubious sexual charms to sway him. 

So, I'd have to resort to subtlety. 

I stuck my hand out at the mechanoid and said, "Hi. My name is Cee Dee. I don't want to sleep with Lister in any way, shape or form." 

Like I said, subtlety... 

They all goggled at me for a moment, then Rimmer burst out laughing. "Well, Listy-poo, there you have it. Indisputable proof the you repel the opposite sex!" 

Lister glared at Rimmer for a second, then turned a hangdog look to me. I made the universal sign for _I didn't really mean it._ I winked at him. He got it in one, and grinned at me. 

Fortunately, no one else noticed it. 

Kryten bustled his way towards Lister and said, in a whisper audible all the way to Earth, "Don't worry, Mr. Lister. You're too good for a woman who dresses like a man, anyway." I pretended outrage. Seemed safest, really. The best way to make friends with Kryten was to leave a mess for him to clean up. If I was on board for long enough, there'd be messes aplenty for him to wax enthusiastic about. 

"Why don't we do something about that, anyway?" This sounded promising. I turned towards Rimmer with a question mark in my eyes. "Well, we can't have you going around looking like Lister, now can we? How about you and I go down to the Officer's Deck and find you some clothes that are suitable." 

"I'll go!" piped up the Cat. 

"Me too, eh?" said Lister. 

"I'll accompany you as well, Miss Dee." Kryten wanted to follow me where I was going? Not good. He wanted to keep an eye on me and then bitch about my habits. I had to get on his good side, but fast. 

"Actually, Kryten, I was wondering if you'd do me a teensy little favor?" I asked. 

"What's that, Ma'am?" 

"I'm totally starving! Could you cook me dinner? I'll take whatever's on board." 

Kryten looked as if his head were about to explode... and then he smiled. "Of course, Ma'am! Anything you like!" He spun on heel and waddled out the door. 

Rimmer leaned in close to me and whispered, "We've got curry and urine re-cyke. You're better off starving, on this ship..." 

I turned to him and looked him in the eyes. 

Shiver... 

"I like curry." I whispered to him. "My husband and I..." 

My husband. Three million years in the past, and I had no way to... The tears started again. 

The Cat looked mildly concerned. Which, I suppose, meant that he cared. Lister was at my side again, his hand on my shoulder. But Rimmer... 

Rimmer moved as far away from me as possible. Like I had some extremely contagious debilitating disease. 

"Perhaps you had better take her to look for clothes, Lister. I'll be... over there..." And, like a shot, he was gone. 

I stared in astonished amazement and hurt. A few tears and that was his reaction? Bolting like a newborn goat? I turned my face towards Lister, confused. He looked down at me with concern. 

"He's a smeghead. He's an emotional retard. He's a total gimboid." 

"He's also rude, ugly, stupid... I could go on like this for a while if you like..." said the Cat. 

I sniffed back my tears and forced a laugh. Still. Why? Why did he run like that? Was it because I'm that much more unattractive when I snivel? Or because I'm an emotional retard too? I had no idea. 

Forget it. I wanted for better clothes. Rimmer and his smeggyness could wait. 

************************* 

"Not bad. Not too bad at all if I do say so meself." 

I did a quick pirouette in front of the full length mirror on the bulkhead. Instead of Lister's smeggy, curry stained wardrobe, I was now fully funtional in a set of dark purple leather pants, with a matching lace-up bustier. There were even a pair of combat boots just my size. I'd never looked so good. Not even when I'd been done up to look like Marilyn Monroe. (Another long story. Let's just say it involved me, an all night music video shoot, and a magical dissapearing bikini top...) 

"Dave, where did you get these? These are a-smegging-mazing!" 

"Well, I raided the officer's quarters, and these were in a stasis trunk. I think they were meant as a Halloween costume... but on you, they work." 

"No kidding. I just wish I could look this good other times." 

"You looked pretty good nekkid..." 

"Oh, shush, you." I studied myself in the mirror again. My hair was still rather ruffled from my bed time, but I have the sort of hair cut that looks better when it's messy. Did it on purpose. 'Cuz I'm a lazy git. My make up was still slightly intact, but I'd need a touch up very soon. Gotta ask if Lister's fashion sense extended to a bit of foundation and mascara... 

Kryten's voice came up on the speakers. 

"Mr. Lister, sir, I believe we've found a suitable moon for scavenge. Permission to take Starbug and scout?" 

"Hold on, Kryts." Lister turned to me. "I think our honeymoon is up. I gotta go down to the drive room." He extended the crook of his arm to me. "Join me?" 

"You're going like that?" I guffawed. 

"Why not?" For he was still dressed in his boxer shorts. 

"At least put on a robe, for Pete's sake!" 

"Oh, so you'd make me cover up the statue David because his knob shows, eh?" 

"Michelangelo should be so lucky..." I retorted with a cocked eyebrow. And he blushed. I made Lister blush! Payback is sweet... He reached into his closet and grabbed a white cotton robe and threw it on. Then he grabbed my hand and escorted me to the door. 

Now, where have I seen that robe before...? 

******************* 

In the drive room, the Cat was lounging on a table and Kryten was arguing with Rimmer. I really had no desire to see Rimmer at the moment, but even so, my heart skipped a beat. Double when Rimmer saw my new outfit and faltered in his non-stop abuse of the mechanoid. 

Kryten took that lapse as an opportunity and jumped back in. 

"Mr. Rimmer, please! It is imperative that you accompany me to this planetoid! I cannot go alone, and since Lister and the Cat are humanoid, they could be exposed to environments leathal to them! You have to come!" 

"Forget it, you clinking, clanking collection of colliginous junk! I am not, repeat NOT, going down there!" 

"I'll go with you, Kryten." 

The crew turned to me like I had sprouted cabbages in my ears. 

"What?" 

"Ma'am, I just stated why you can't accompany us! You could be exposed to radiation! You could die!" 

"Not if I stay in the 'Bug. C'mon, I've never been on another planet before! I'll be real quiet and not make any trouble and I'll cook for you on the way..." 

"Well then, I'm going too," stated Rimmer abruptly. 

"Me too." 

"Count me in!" Lister and the Cat were suddenly all smiles and enthusiasm. All over little old me? Preposterous. But fun... 

"I'm afraid not, Listy-poo. You and the Cat need to remain on board to stand watch. As your superior officer, I order you to stay behind!" 

"Aw, c'mon, Rimmer... Just seconds ago you didn't want to go at all!" 

"Duty before pleasure, Lister. And that ends this discussion." 

"Um. I really don't want to be a bother... I was kidding, after all..." 

Rimmer turned to me, smiling. I smiled back. Couldn't help myself. Lister rolled his eyes. 

"M'dear, you are never a bother. Come, Kryten. Off to another planet we go!" 

He spun on heel and was gone toward the landing bay. Lister made a disgusted noise and also left, with the Cat close on his heels. Obviously to try to talk Rimmer out of taking me on the excursion. Which left me in the room alone with Kryten. 

Kryten studied me for a moment. I regarded him back. Finally, after several moments of oppressive silence, he spoke. 

"Ma'am. I don't know where you come from. I don't know anything about you. And yet you seem to think that you can waltz in here and be considered a member of the crew simply because you've got all those in and out bits that men find so nice." 

"Kryten..." 

"Please, ma'am, let me finish! I just want you to know that I'll be watching you very closely." 

"Why?" 

This seemed to take him aback. "Why?" 

"Yes. Why?" 

"Well, I..." Something seemed to click in his mechanoid brain. "Because you're a woman." 

"Yes. I know." 

"How very odd..." 

"Odd? That I'm a woman?" 

"No, ma'am. Odd that I've never noticed this in my core programming before." 

"This what?" 

"Buried deep in my database is an algorithim that dictates my response to women. It is not a pleasant one. I have been programmed to react with jealousy whenever a woman is in the general vicinity. Why it's odd is because my creator was a woman." 

"Well, Kryten, I think that explains a lot. In general, women are jealous people..." Except myself, of course. Not a jealous bone in my body... well, maybe one or two. Or possibly more... 

Kryten stared at me. Then his eyes went blank for a moment. Then his head slumped. He looked as if he were shutting himself down. 

"Kryten? Kryten?!?" 

Oh, god, I broke him... 

I reached forward to try and touch his shoulder. Just millimeters away, he woke up again. I jumped back, startled. 

"Do not panic, ma'am. I was simply altering that particular piece of code. Welcome aboard." 

I blinked. 

"No kidding?" 

"No kidding indeed, ma'am. Come, we have a planetoid to explore." 

And so saying, he took me by the hand, (very gently) and led me down to the landing bay. 

*************************** 

It was strange, but everything seemed like it was going my way. Every time a question about my origin came up, it was shunted aside for more pressing business. Every time a particularly unpleasant circumstance reared it's ugly head, it would simply go away. Like Rimmer and the crying jag. I saw him not twenty minutes later, and it was as if it was totally forgotten. And Kryten and his suspicion and jealousy. I knew, I just knew, that his response to Kochanski in later series would affect me. And by simply shutting down that particular piece of code, he welcomed me aboard and invited me down on an "away mission." None of this was making any sense at all. If this really were the Red Dwarf posse, they would have really encountered me as a brain sucking alien. Or a deranged piece of military ordnance. Or something equally nasty. Because these poor smeggers never get any breaks. So why am I so easily assimilated? Why is this universe making an exception for me? 

If I had figured out sooner what episode I was caught in, I woulda guessed. 

Ya see, the universe wasn't giving the boys an even break. The universe was about to piss in my cornflakes, too. 

********************************************** 

_**AN:** More to come soon. I swear. I know I haven't updated Parole in a really really long time. It's cuz I'm stuck. I wrote a nasty last chapter, and haven't the foggiest notion how to get out of it. I'm trying, tho. God knows I'm trying._


	2. Quest

_**AN:** Forgot to disclaim in the first chapter. My bad. All Red Dwarf characters belong to Grant Naylor, I make no money off of them, I'm only doing this for fun. Same goes for the book Atlas Shrugged, the author of that novel, and the movies Fight Club, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, The Princess Bride and any random Star Wars or Star Trek references that may pop up from time to time. _

Now, I want to warn you ahead of time, there is a scene in this chapter which is very violent. It's there for a reason, so keep that in mind. If violence offends you, then read no further. If you think that the scene in question is worse than a PG-13 rating, I will update the rating. 

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Space, the final... something or other. It sure as hell isn't a frontier. Fontiers are generally understood to be exciting. 

You grow up watching these scifi shows, even slightly smeggy comical ones, and no matter how good the show is, you are never shown the boringness of space. For damn good reason. Boring doesn't win awards. There's no Emmy for, "The most boring show on television." So instead, you get diurnal anamolies, and temporal rifts, and dilithium crystals, and Klingons around every corner, and big smegging holes in the fabric of space-time. 

It's not true. Not even remotely so. That four hour flight was the most boring trip I've ever taken. When you're in a plane, or even a car, there are things to look at. Scenery, landmarks, the clouds in the sky, the people around you. In space, you can only look at little twinkly bits for so long before thinking, _Is that the same little twinkly bit as before? If it isn't, should I care?_ I wished I had my copy of _Atlas Shrugged_ with me. That's a book you can definately sink your teeth into. There's no way you can finish that book in under two days, let alone four hours. There's just something about the Russian genome that makes it's writers long winded. Maybe there's a psychology thesis in there, somewhere... 

Interesting side note. I've always been terrified of planes. It's not the flying so much as the possibility of falling from 50,000 feet. I can't even watch the news anymore because of all the plane crash stories. Gives me the heebie jeebies. But when I got onto the 'Bug with Rimmer and Kryten, I wasn't afraid in the least. When we left the ship, with black all around and a funny spinny sensation in my stomache, I was fine. Perhaps because there's nothing to fall towards? 

In any event, we headed toward the planet at something like warp 4, but I was told (by Kryten, of course) that the warp drive didn't exist here. So we were just going really, really fast. Those were Kryten's exact words. So scientific... 

We landed on the planet after an indeterminable time, by my thinking, anyway. I take back what I said of about being scared of flying in space. Space is fine. Entering the atmosphere sucks. I sweated like a cold glass full of lemonade on a hot summer day. Landing is no picnic, either. Especially with Kryten at the controls. Kryten seems to be of the school of thought that whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger. I had no desire to be either. I said a quick prayer to Pete, God of Internet Nerds. _Dear Pete, please let me get through this madness alive and I swear I shall make the sacrifice of an AOL user unto thee. I shall even use the word haxor in an upcoming fan fiction. Amen._

We landed. Kryten did a quick scan. Breathable atmosphere. Normal background radiation. No life signs. 

Ergo: I could step onto a totally different planet. I was excited. I was thrilled. 

I was disappointed. There was very little to see. (Of course, the fact that I'd left my glasses behind in my own universe didn't help things much. But even still...) A few scraggly bushes and rocks, and a dreary, open plain as far as the eye could see. Nothing else. Kryten wandered off towards an outcropping of rocks a few meters distant, his scanner beeping pathetically. 

I sidled up to Rimmer. "This is fun." 

He smirked at me. "Well, the life of a Space Adventurer can be quite grand at times..." 

I heard the capital letters thunk into place. This was going to turn into, "Impress the female," time. I had to ask, "Rimmer, why are you trying so hard to impress me? I'm really not all that special, after all..." 

Rimmer looked incredulously at me. "Not all that special? I've known you for, what? Less than a day, and even I can tell you're smart, funny, compassionate and above all, beautiful, Cee Dee." 

I startled at his use of my assumed name. I hid it by saying, "Get over!" 

Now, before you start yelling, "Mary Sue!" at the top of your lungs like a war-whoop, I'm not trying to engender sympathy here. I know exactly what I am. I sell my image every day as an actress. I'm the girl next door. I'm the sister of the glamourous star. I'm the slightly catty girlfriend of the hero, who leaves me behind to fall in love with the female lead of the movie. I'm Meg Ryan, without the charm that made her what she is. I smoke. (Even in California, where smoking is considered slightly above mass murder and slightly below incest.) I swear like a trucker and I dress like a ho. Sometimes, anyway. I love tight pants. And my figure isn't cut out for them. A bum the size of Manhattan. I remember one time, in grade school, when I was called, "Have another oreo, kiddo." By one of my teachers. 

My husband was the first person ever in my life to tell me that I was beautiful. Really beautiful. And he really meant it. I love him dearly for that, but I know that he's saying that through rose colored glasses. He loves me. For what reasons, I don't think I'll ever really know. But I know what I am. Beautiful? Really, mind bogglingly, knock-your-socks-off beautiful? Nope. Not me. I'm vivacious. I'm agressive. I'm loud and domineering. Which can be mistaken for self-esteem and beauty if the beholder doesn't know me that well. 

Rimmer fit this category perfectly. 

He looked me over for a brief moment, and said, "Yes. You're very beautiful. Even that costume doesn't detract from it." 

I grinned at him. "Lister dug this up. Not me. Besides, I happen to like purple. My wedding was all purple." 

Rimmer paled. Then, he croaked out, "So you are married? I wasn't just imagining that you said you had a husband?" 

I gulped. Well, there it was. No avoiding it now. "Yes, Rimmer, I am married. Just two months ago." 

We stared at each other for a moment. I wondered if Rimmer would have the guts to declare that he loved me. True, he didn't know me very well, but then, he hadn't known what's-her-face on the Holoship _Enlightenment_ all that well either. And had gotten it on with her. So what he did next was totally unexpected. For Rimmer, anyway. 

He smiled. "I'm happy for you," he said. And turned and walked away, towards Kryten. 

I was stunned. I expected a scene. Whining. Tears, even. I knew that he wanted me. He said I was beautiful. That was usually what men said when they wanted to get in my pants. 

One young man, a young man by the name of Bradley, had told me that in high school. At the time, he was "going out" with a friend of mine, a gal by the name of Manny. She was swell, and I loved her company. Then, one afternoon on the football field, Bradley and I were alone, and he told me he thought I was very beautiful. And, being a silly sixteen-year-old, I was enamored. He broke it off with Manny, which effectively ended our friendship. 

Then, about a week after he and I were, "together," he tried to rape me. 

It was my own silly fault. I let him get me drunk at a party and take me away from generally everything. The only thing that stopped him was the fact that he was pretty drunk too. That, and a well placed knee to that certain area can do wonders for stopping an attacker. I fled. I ran like the devil himself was on my tail. 

I never told anyone about it. I told my husband of course, but much later, and I've never really gotten over it. I suppose justice was served in a way, because the bastard tried to get back together with Manny, who told him to piss up a flagpole. She and I even worked things out and became friends again. And word spread that Bradley was a right prick who shouldn't ever get a date. So he didn't. 

Now here I was, some 3 million years into the future, faced with another man who told me that I was beautiful. Who was walking away from me. 

_MEN!_

I didn't have time to vent my frustration and confusion, however. I heard a sound coming from below my feet that sounded like a train and a mac truck getting into a fist fight. The ground started to rumble like it was Lister who had eaten too many curries. Being a California girl, I knew what was going on. 

"_**EARTHQUAKE!!!**_" I yelled at the mechanoid and the hologram. They were mere steps from me. I struggled over the dancing landscape towards them. Then, to my complete horror and astonishment, the empty, grassy plain on my left side began to bubble. Trees, looking centuries old, covered with liana vines and other various pests, erupted from the ground. There was the stench of sulfer and brimstone. And wet muck. Off in the distance, a castle began to form. Nearby rocks sailed up into the sky and towards the newly budding (ominous, eerie) structure. To my right side, I saw glaciers and snow magically appear, as if this were one of the sets from _Titanic_. For some reason, it was this landscape, and not the swamp that terrified me the most. And dead (ahem, oops, bad choice of phrase, there...) ahead, I saw Kryten fall over, overcome by the powerful bucking of the ground. This was no ordinary earthquake. This was personal. 

My arms windmilled as I tried to keep my balance. I saw Rimmer running toward me at full tilt, while Krtyen struggled to get up. How on Earth Rimmer was running, I'll never know. He should have been flat on his back. But somehow, he reached me, and to my even greater astonishment, _wrapped his arms around me and drove me to the ground!_

But Rimmer was a hologram... 

Then, it hit me. I had seen Lister's robe before. To my knowledge, he only wore it in one episode. And Rimmer being able to touch me, pre-Legion. And a planetoid that altered it's surface to welcome guests... 

Terrorform. I was smack dab in the middle of the episode Terrorform. 

I wriggled in Rimmer's bearhug, trying against try that we'd be able to get back to the 'Bug before... 

Too late. The explosion that Kryten described in the beginning of that episode, well... 

It happened. 

****************** 

Blackness... 

****************** 

I came to, surrounded by the color blue, and cold, and penguins. The penguins weren't paying that much attention to me. They were gamboling and frolicking as if there wasn't a human in their midst. It seemed familiar, and then I realized why. I recognised this set from the movie _Fight Club._ If one of those penguins said, "Slide," to me, I was going to go totally bonkers. 

If I hadn't already. 

This wasn't in Terrorform. This was from Fight Club. So why the hell was I here? And where the hell was Rimmer? 

As soon as I thought of Rimmer, a wave of nausea swept over me. It was odd, but it was as if the imagined sight of his face made me ill. So I tried an experiment. I thought of my favorite scene from Terrorform. You know which one I mean. It involves oil and a scantily clad Rimmer. Instantly, I gasped in pain, as my lower abdomen cramped up. I felt as if someone had wrapped their hand around my spleen and squeezed. I sat down with a jarring bump on a nearby chunk of ice. 

I took a few deep, calming breaths and tried to blank my mind. It was apparent to even me (I can be a tad slow on the uptake) that the thought of Rimmer caused me pain. Cautiously, I tried thinking of Lister. Nothing. The Cat, nothing, Kryten, nothing. Of course. This was a psi-moon. So people I was indifferent to, or at least wasn't attracted to, wouldn't have an effect on me. 

Then, my mind jumped to my husband. 

This time, it wasn't just my spleen, but my liver, lungs, asophagas, brain and all the rest of my organs that cried out in pain and panic. I think I may have screamed. Then... 

**************** 

Blackness... 

**************** 

I came to a second time, once again surrounded by penguins. But this time, the penguins had human faces. And they were all faces that I knew. Ex-boyfriends, friends I'd lost touch with, people I'd met in my travels and tribulations. Even the faces of a few celebrities were tossed in for good measure. As I scanned the... crowd... there was only one face missing. That of my husband's. 

Ok. Now this was getting quite bizarre. Would someone please call Glinda, the Good Witch of the North? I wanna click my heels together and go home, now. 

A penguin waddled up to me. It bore the face of a woman that I had briefly worked with when I was just out of high school. Annie? Amy? Alice? I couldn't remember her name. But I knew who she was. And she knew who I was. 

"Cee Dee, what are you doing here?" 

A talking penguin that had the face of an old aquaintance who just happened to know my assumed name... 

"I don't know." I'm not going mad I'm not going mad I'm not going mad I'm only talking to a penguin. 

"Cee Dee, we're afraid that there's been a cock-up. You aren't supposed to be here. This Psi-moon wasn't meant for two minds at once. It was built for therapy purposes. One patient at a time. Dump him here, make the psychosis real, and _then_ come down to cure him. With the two of you both here at once, the mechanism went into overload. So now the planet is a conglomeration of both your minds." 

"Me and who?" 

"Arnold Judas Rimmer, of course." 

I flinched, waiting for the pain to hit me again. It didn't. Amy/Annie/Alice noticed. 

"Yeah, sorry about that. It's fixed. It's meant to be a tool to help the patient let go of images that hurt them." 

"Then why...?" 

"Did you get the response when you thought of your husband? That's something you have to figure out. That's why the planet's here, after all." 

She turned away from me, and the group of human-faced penguins all turned at the same time to go. Like robots. It was creepy. 

"Wait! What'm I supposed to do now?" 

The one who had been speaking to me turned around. Her face was slowly morphing back to that of a normal penguin. Her mouth was the last to shift. 

"Find yourself. And go home." 

The human mouth became a beak, and the only noises that I heard then were the creaking of the warm wind against the cold ice, and the occasional bleating quack of penguins. I was alone again. 

I could only do what the penguin told me to. I had to find myself. Whatever the hell that meant. It sounded like a bunch of tree-hugging hippy crap, to me. But going home. That sounded promising. And if I had to, "Find myself," along the way, well... whatever. 

So I stood up from my chilly perch on the ice and moved towards where the warm wind was seemingly coming from. 

And came smack dab up against a wall of ice. 

Now, this made no sense. I could feel the warm breeze on my face, and it was coming directly from the wall. To all available evidence, there should be no wall there. But there it was. I tentatively put a hand against it. Very solid, and very cold. I pushed a bit. It didn't give and, strangely enough, the wind pushed back at me a bit. I placed both hands on the wall and leaned against it as hard as I could. The wind howled at me, and got so strong that it shoved me back forcibly from the wall, sending me sprawling. 

Odd. 

I turned my back to the wall. I was frustrated. I was even feeling a cry begin in the back of my sinuses. As soon as my back was to the wall, however, the wind got warmer. I felt as if dozens of tiny, warm hands were stroking my naked neck, arms, ruffling my hair, making my legs move away from the wall. I was being led. Led towards what, I had no idea. I walked for about fifty feet, through twists and turns and ups and downs, the whole time being gently pushed from behind by invisible hands. At the end of my brief journey, I came upon an opening in the cave, which seemed to reveal a great expanse of lush green bamboo. I stepped out of the cave. I turned just in time to see it seal itself up. 

************** 

"Thanks..." I said weakly. To no one in particular. I was talking to the wind. 

To my surprise, the wind answered me. In the voice of Arnold J. Rimmer. 

"Look, I don't know who you people are, but if I don't get my right to a phone call, you'll be sorry, mi'laddos." 

I spun around. There was no one there. I was alone in a forest of bamboo trees. But for the briefest of moments, I caught a flash of darkness, little men that looked like Jawas, and Rimmer, clad in a white toga, strapped to what looked like a crucifix. Our eyes met. And then it was gone. 

I knew that scene. It was after Kryten had been damaged in the explosion, had used his detachable hand and eyeball, gotten the thing into a homing pod, which then met up with the Dwarf. And after Lister was down on the planet to fix Kryten. So I must have been out for a long while. I only had a short time before the crew was back down here, and mounted the Rimmer Rescue operation. Which would, incidentally, save my bacon, too. 

I set off through the bamboo shoots. It was quiet, and peaceful, and more than a little eerie. I could hear birds calling out, and the occasional rustle of underbrush as I startled a small animal with my walking. It was strange, but I felt very... content. Yes, that's the word. Content to wander this forest until I died. It was magical. I could sense it. 

God, talk about a bunch of tree-hugging hippy crap... Where were these thoughts coming from? It sure as hell wasn't _my_ mind coming up with these feelings. And I doubted that Rimmer had known a day of contentment in his life. So? Where was this coming from? 

"You're mistaken. It is your contentment you feel." 

My head jerked back and forth, tring to spot my surprise guest. ("Tonight, coming to you live from Cee Dee's brain...") There was no one around. 

"Pssst. Up here." 

I glanced up, only to be waved at by a man, dressed in white robes, who was fifty feet up in the air and _balancing himself on one single piece of bamboo._

No way. First _Fight Club_, now _Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon_? This is getting surreal... 

My new friend took a single step to his left, and, instead of falling like a brick, he floated down. I shrieked when he made his move, only to gape in silent wonder as he performed his levitaition trick. I should have known better. The man could fly after all. Master Li Mu Bai was a character that could do many amazing things. He settled down next to me. 

"Hello." 

"Hello yourself. Shouldn't you be fighting Sha-Long right about now?" 

"She'll come along shortly. Right now, I'm your guide. After a fashion. The only real guide through your mind is yourself." 

"Profound." He smiled wryly at me. "So, essentially, you're a manifestation of my inner calm?" 

"No, nothing like that. You just think I'm very cool." 

I had to giggle. It was true. A very cool guy in a very cool movie. 

"So what am I supposed to do now? I've seen the cave, and I've seen the forest, and I have to get to the swamp and the castle beyond if I'm going to meet up with the guys." Wow. All of a sudden, I'm in really bad D&D game... 

"You can't get there from here." 

Oh, wonderful... "So I'm basically screwed?" 

"No. It's just that you can't get there from here." 

I sighed. Obliqueness has never really been one of my favorite things in the world. I'm an up-front kinda gal. So here I am, confronted with a part of my own mind, and I'm being oblique as hell. Not good. 

"Can you give me any advice? Anything that could help me along?" 

Li Mu Bai reached into his robes and handed me a small knife of the Swiss Army variety. "I've found that these are quite helpful. That, and duct tape." I could only raise an eyebrow at him. Thank you, Mr. Cliche... 

"Now if you'll excuse me..." With that, he turned and ran up one of the nearby bamboo trees, drawing his sword and leaping away towards the horizon. If I listened carefully, I could hear the clink of blade against blade. Looks like Sha-Long finally showed up... 

I glanced down at the knife in my hand. Instead of it being red, with the cross-in-shield logo, it was purple (again with the purple!) and bore a yin-yang on it. It was slightly raised out of the resin that made up the sheath. I ran a finger over it. It was cold to the touch, and appeared to be made out of moonstone. Pretty, yes. Helpful to my, "quest?" How? 

I sighed again. I had no pockets, (stupid leather pants) and I couldn't tuck it in my decolletage ('cuz it's pointy, that's why!). So I'd just have to carry it. Meh. Whatever. 

As I continued my amble through the forest, I was struck by the realization that I hadn't seen any more flashes of Rimmer since leaving the cave. I concentrated for a moment. After the scene on the cross with the Jawas, Rimmer had been taken to that castle, where he was oiled down by the blondes with the gold fingernails. It was a yummy thought for me. I felt a small smile come to my lips as I pondered it. 

Well, that did the trick. I was not standing in the forest anymore. I was standing directly across from a bound and half-naked Rimmer. My mouth opened in shock. How the hell...? He looked right at me. 

"Cee Dee? Where the smegging hell did you come from? Get me out of here!" 

I blinked. 

And I was back in the forest. 

_Dammit!_

How in Hades had that happened? I tried thinking of that scene again, but I couldn't get the wanted miracle to occur. I was back where I started. 

Then, a thought burrowed it's way up into my brain. The penguin back in the cave had told me that the world was now a conglomeration of my mind and Rimmer's. And Li Mu Bai told me I couldn't get to Rimmer from where I was now. So, logically, it wasn't a conglomeration, per se, but more of an overlap. The world I was in wasn't the same world as Rimmer. We were taking up space in our own private minds, but the psi-moon was overlapping them. Probably because it couldn't handle two minds at once. The flashes I was seeing of Rimmer were moments when the membrane between our minds shifted. Or possibly when we thought of each other at the same time. 

And no amount of concentrating was going to get me there. I had to figure out a way to not only clear a path in my own mind, but to clear a path into Rimmer's mind as well. 

No wonder I couldn't get there from here. I'd have to be a smegging psychic. 

Well, nothing to do but go forward. If I was lucky, another solution would present itself. In the meantime, I had my own baggage to handle. 

***************** 

I took a step forward, and tripped. And landed face down in slightly squishy, foul smelling, dramatically lit swamp. 

I raised my head, confused. I wasn't drenched, thank Pete, but I was covered head to toe in rotting leaves and moss. And my knife had fallen out of my hand and disappeared. I stood up, disgusted and perplexed. I moved about in circles, looking around for my knife. How had I gotten from that beautiful forest from _Crouching Tiger_ and ended up here? In a swamp that had very little water in the ground? With strange popping noises every few seconds? Strange popping noises? What the... 

Instinct took over as I sprinted away from the clicks and pops. Wheeling back around, I saw that where I had been standing, there was a pillar of fire. And it was shooting out of the ground. 

I was in the Guilder Fire Swamp. 

I stopped in my search for my missing knife. To hell with it! If I took so much as a misstep, I could fall into a pit of snow sand, and there would be no Westley nearby to save me. Now, ok, was this going to be the Fire Swamp from the book? Or from the movie? It looked like the movie, but only because I'd read the book after I'd seen the movie, so my imagination was tilted in that direction. 

(Oh brother. I shoulda read less fantasy and more... I dunnow. John Grisham perhaps. At least most of those take place in nice, warm, clean courtrooms. Of course, people die in those... but you can't have everything.) 

A figure was moving towards me from the other side of a shadow. I saw a flash of red, and a sweep of golden hair. 

Princess Buttercup. 

"Hello. I believe you dropped this." She handed me my knife. 

"Thanks." I blinked at her as she sat herself down on a protruding tree branch. "So, is this now, what? The second in a series of movie characters designed to show me the inner working of my mind? Shouldn't you and Westley be fighting R.O.U.Ses?" 

"All in good time. Now, you have questions again. I'm going to answer them for you." 

Questions? Yeah, a couple... 

"Why me? I mean, why did I end up here in the first place?" 

"I can't answer that now. Next question." 

Oh, so very helpful... 

"Fine. Where's my graveyard?" 

"Beg your pardon?" 

"My graveyard. Where all my old personality traits are lying dead in my mind. Rimmer had one. Where's mine?" 

"Rimmer never saw his. The others found it. Same for you." 

Made sense... 

"Ok. Try this one on for size; Why is it that, in the episode of Terrorform I saw, Rimmer is held captive, and yet with me in the equation, I can wander about as I please?" 

"You know the answer to that one. Think about it." 

Grrrr... 

And yet, she was right. Rimmer was terrified of not being in control at any given time. So of course his mind would manifest a prisoner situation. 

Wait a cotton pickin' minute. That's one of my fears too... 

I turned to Buttercup, but she was gone. And the Fire Swamp was slowly fading out of my vision, as well. I blinked to clear my sight. A foul smelling wind whipped up from nowhere, coughing dust into the air around me. I sneezed and choked, waving my hand in front of my face, trying to get a clean breath of air. Suddenly, the wind was gone as fast as it had come. I cautiously opened my eyes again. 

**************** 

I was no longer in the swamp. I was in a room, decorated with posters of The Smashing Pumpkins and Nirvana and Pearl Jam. There was a bed, and a television with a nintendo, and a few half-assed candles, and piles of dirty clothes strewn about. 

I knew this room. This was the room where I was nearly raped. 

And just to make me feel even better, my would be rapist entered the room. 

Almost 10 years later, and this son of a bitch still had the power to make me nearly shit my pants. He moved towards me, smelling of cheap booze and pot and cigarettes. He looked exactly as I remebered him. Adolescent acne, long greasy hair, long black trenchcoat covering his black clothes, everything. And here I was, a mature, happy, grown-up woman... No. No I wasn't. I was sixteen again. My hair was long and pulled back in my omnipresent ponytail. My glasses hung off the end of my nose, the frames having been chosen out of the bargain bin, and subsequently being very large and ugly. I could feel the braces wrapped round my teeth again. My dress were drab, and baggy, and horribly out of style. I was no longer the confident (ha!) woman I projected to the world. I was the awkward, gawky teenager I always tried to keep hidden. Because of this night. 

"Hey, baby. Great party, huh?" 

His words came at me as if from a great distance, like I was hearing him speak through a cardboard tube. There was an aura around him. Mostly because I was seeing double. I was drunk. I remembered that I had had a forty of Micky's, and various other shots, mostly mixed in with Jello to hide the taste. I shook my head, trying to clear away the drunkeness. He mistook this for a denial of his question. 

"No? Aw, I'm having a great time!" He moved in towards me again, and started kissing my neck, my cheek. 

Revulsion. There are no words to describe the absolute revulsion I felt run through me. I ducked my head away from his seeking mouth. "Brad, no. I'm not feeling so great. I think I'm gonna barf." 

"That's only 'cuz you're drunk, kiddo. Don't worry, I won't let anything happen to you. I love you." 

"I love you too." I felt my mouth speaking the words, no matter how hard I tried to stop them. I was reliving this scene, word for word, exact in every detail. I couldn't change it, no more than I could change the orbit of the Earth around the Sun. It was a fixed event in my past. 

That thought gave me a bit of hope. I knew how this was going to turn out. He wouldn't be able to follow through with his attack. He was too drunk. 

He moved in again, and said, "Baby, if you love me, then let's do it." 

I gently moved his hand from my breast. "No. I really don't feel good tonight, Brad. Another time, I promise." 

"You're such a tease." He placed his hand back on my breast again, only this time, he squeezed. Hard. 

"Ow. Brad, that hurt. Cut it out." I grabbed his wrist and pushed it away from me. 

That's when, in my memory, he tackled me, pinned me to the bed. He grabbed at my dress and flipped it up, clutched at my panties, trying to get me naked. I struggled away from him, and in the process, put my knee into his groin. He yelped like a stuck pig and slipped off the bed, giving me more than ample opportunity to run back to the party that was going on upstairs. 

That was my memory. What happened next was the psi-moon. 

Instead of trying to tackle me, he gave me a vicious backhand to the face. 

The room spun around me, my cheek throbbing in agony. 

What the hell...? 

"You know you like it, bitch. You're such a slut. I've heard about you. You put out for every man that comes along. And now you're gonna get it from me." 

I could only tremble at him. _How did he know? How did he know that that's what I thought of myself when I was 16?_ So when he moved toward me again, I shrank into a ball against the headboard of the bed, turned my face away from him. He grabbed at my ponytail and yanked my head down. My arms flailed away from my knees, my legs spasmed apart. It was the pain. I couldn't control myself. 

He wedged his body between my now open legs, and gave me another slap across the face. I tried to struggle out from under him, trying the same trick that got me out of this situation the first time. But I was too well pinned. I had no control of the situation. He had me. 

His hands moved to the hem of my dress, and he ripped it right up the front, leaving me in my panties and bra. He shifted himself, grabbing my arms, and pinned them under his knees. I couldn't so much as wiggle. I saw him move his hands toward my crotch. I screamed out, "NO!" 

He moved his hand away from there, balled it up in a fist and punched me in the solar plexus. 

I grunted and gasped, the wind knocked out of me, and the feeling that I was going to puke tripled. I looked up at my attacker. His eyes were shining with malice. I couldn't stand to see him. I closed my eyes as he moved back towards his target. I heard his zipper come down. I felt his hands groping at me, his hips subtly bucking in anticipation. 

He was really going to rape me, and there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it. I clenched my fists, giving in to the inevitable, steeling myself against this outcome. 

And felt the knife in my hand. It had never left. I had it the whole time. 

Duh. 

I felt along the edge of the knife until I found the little groove in the biggest blade. I struggled for a moment with it, it wouldn't immediately open. So I wedged the bottom of the knife against Brad's calf, and the blade flicked free with an audible, "Snick." 

He heard it. His head swiveled toward the sound, just as I poked him in the hip with it. He jumped off of me, yelling. He looked terrified. Good. 

"Now, don't get crazy, babe. It was just a little fun." 

I pushed myself off of the bed, clutching at both halves of my dress with one hand, the other hand waving my little knife in front of me like a banner. 

"Hold on now, baby! Don't think I was gonna hurt you. I just thought..." 

"With your prick. Which is what you are!" I moved in closer, and he shrunk away from me. 

"Oh, God, don't hurt me. I'm sorry, I'm sorry..." 

I wanted to hurt him. I wanted to hurt him as badly as he had hurt me. For years after this attack, I was terrified of it happening again. Even when I was first with my husband, before we were married, I was scared of him. So I did something incredibly stupid to hold him at arms length. It still haunts me... But that was neither here nor there. 

I stared at Brad for a moment, and dropped the knife to my side. "You don't deserve it. Not even you. I won't hurt you." 

"This is all your fault anyway, bitch!" He made a move as if to stand, thinking that he had disarmed me. The knife was nuzzled into his neck before he knew what was going on. He froze again. 

"No. It wasn't my fault. I trusted you. You attacked me. This is your fault." 

At these words, he began to melt away, as did the rest of the room. I felt my torn dress morph back into my leathers, my hair shorten, my ugly glasses disappear. 

I was back in the Fire Swamp, and Princess Buttercup sat in front of me again. 

************** 

I panted for a moment, trying to re-orient myself. I blinked at Buttercup. 

"What the _smegging hell_ was that?" 

"It was yourself. You accepted that that situation wasn't your fault. You've moved on." 

She was right. I felt shaken, but better. I gazed at her for a moment. "Man, this place sure packs a wallop. Are there any more nasty surprises in store for me?" 

"That depends entirely upon you. Is there anything else that you feel you need to move past?" 

I took a deep breath. "Yes." I knew what was coming. I was about to be faced with a scene that would nearly kill me. I was going to have to face the day that I told my husband that I cheated on him. 

Buttercup looked at me peacefully. "You can't face that here. This is your adolescence. That took place in your adulthood." 

"Wait, you're telling me that each of the places I've been so far is symbolic of the stages of my life?" 

"Of course." 

"It wasn't with Rimmer..." 

"Rimmer is screwed up in ways that defy description." 

And with that true remark, she stood and said, "You're on the right path. You're adulthood is right through that grove of trees." She pointed. "Good luck to you." And she went as silently as she had come, to meet up with Westley and an R.O.U.S. 

I was alone again. And walking into a place that I really had no desire to go... 

********************************************************** 

  
_**AN:** Wow. That was traumatic. First, I want you all who may worry about me, that that scene did not ever happen to me. It's fiction people. Second, sorry that that chapter didn't have a whole lot of Red Dwarf stuff in it. But the next chapter will._ 


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